Maoists sweeping elections
By Bhola B Rana
Kathmandu, 14 April: Dr Baburam Bhattarai has staked a claim to lead a government.
The second leader of the CPN (Maoist) staked the claim as the party leads in vote counting with a likelihood of gaining a majority in direct elections for 240 seats in the constituent assembly which will have 601-member constituent assembly, another 335 members will be indirectly elected.
Maoists have won 86 of 161 declared seats and lead in 39 other constituencies as Congress and CPN-UML trail in second and third positions.
Madesh Janaadhikar Forum (MJF) is establishing itself as the largest regional party in the tarai.
Congress has claimed 28, CPN-UML 24, MJF 13, Tarai Madesh Loktantrik Party four, Nepal Majdoor Kishan Party 2 , Janamorcha Nepal and Nepal Sadbavana Party (Mahoto) one seat each.
MJF, TMLP and NSP (Mahoto) aren’t represented in the Koirala government.
Bawan Singh, an independent candidate was elected from Rautahat where Secretary general of CPN-UML Madhav Kumar Nepal trails behind a Maoist candidate in another constituency in the district by more than 1,000 votes.
RPP-Nepal Chairman Kamal Thapa forfeited his deposit in Hetauda; a candidate needs to collect at least 1o percent vote cast; Thapa got only 3,853 votes.
Former Prime Minister Sher Bahadur Deuba (Congress) has been elected from Dandelhura and Kanchanpur.
Prime Minister Girija Prasad Koirala’s nephew and son of BP Koirala Dr Shashanka Koirala was elected from a Nawalparasi constituency; other members of the.Koirala kitchen cabinet Mahesh Acharya and Chakra Prasad Koirala were also defeated in Morang and Jhapa respectively.
Chairman Prachanda was also elected from Rolpa.
Baburam Bhattarai was elected from Gorkha with the largest majority of 46,272 votes defeating his nearest rival by 40,129 votes.
RPP Chairman Pashupati SJB Rana was defeated from two constituencies in Sindhualchowk for the first time in 35 years.